Turn off contacts in the iOS 13 Share Sheet

The share tab was changed and while there is some ability to control what apps you can share to, there appears to be no way to turn off having contacts listed on the share tab nor is there an ability to control which contacts appear. They appear to be selected based on most recently used possibly among other factors or "secret formula".

I think Apple took this move as a strong arm approach to promote/force more usage of the iMessage app over other sharing apps. For example, when I do share links, it is usually with WhatsApp, which now requires deeper screen navigation to get at each time because the screen real-estate is now taken up by Apple's choice of my iMessage recipients (none of whom I ever share links with).

I put in an apple feedback to: Feedback - iPhone - Apple. Recommend that anyone who does not like this feature to put in a feedback for it also asking Apple to allow the user to configure whether they want iMessage/text message contacts to appear there or not.

You can toggle this on or off.....

go into settings

Siri & Search

Under Siri suggestions deselect the option “suggestions when sharing”

hope that helps

Hello All,

I have a solution to this issue, and it is real - but first I am going to put on my flame proof hat, because I only found my way here because I was looking for a way to turn this feature back ON ha ha!

Basically after an update my share suggestions stopped displaying iMessage and their suggested contacts. I could only see suggested contacts from Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger etc and wanted to re-enable iMessage.

To cut a long story short you need to go to Settings --> Siri & Search, scroll down and you will see a list of all apps on your phone. If you choose Messages (for example) you will see some options with switches. If you switch off the first two options (Show Siri Suggestions in App & Learn from this App) you will no longer get iMessage suggestions when sharing. Do the same for all other apps (or at least those you don't want to see) and voila! The answer to this problem is presented.

Alternatively you could just turn off the Siri suggestions all together.

Anyway I hope that helps!

[Edited by Moderator]

For now the only workaround to turning off the contacts from appearing in the iOS 13 share sheet is to individually delete their Message threads from the Messages app.

It seems to work, look 👇

To remove the AirDrop contacts, you will need to go into your Control Center > AirDrop and change from Contacts Only or Everyone to Recieving Off.

Source: https://www.saintlad.com/remove-contacts-in-ios-13-share-sheet/

FJR030 wrote:

Please give the user the ability to control what apps/FB show in the share screen. I’m looking for the same answer. Did anyone find out anything?

You cannot do that at this time. You can let Apple know you'd like to see them make such a change here:

Product Feedback - Apple

For me, only one contact has been showing up on the list and I realized it was just because I wished them happy birthday via an iMessage recently. I normally don’t use iMessages anymore. Our previous conversation was 2 years earlier. So I just deleted my happy birthday message and that contact stopped appearing in the Share Sheet.

So it seems like that part of the Share Sheet is time-sensitive. So you can try deleting a few messages rather than having to delete the entire conversation.

Of course it would be better if Apple allowed you to turn this off completely. Having that one random contact there kept giving me anxiety about accidental shares and she’s not the person I share with the most.

Westcarver wrote:

I have a Iphone 8 plus with version 13.4.1 ..I too when i pull up the share have a line of VK personal contacts that I have sent things to accidently and also I don't want people seeing this ..most are contacts i never use.. How do I get rid of it?please

You can’t turn it off.

Don’t confirm that a wrong contact is who you want to send something to.

All Apple apps require a second step to “accidentally” share something.

if you use a third party app that does not, contact them.

If you delete the entire message thread of a contact it then deletes them from suggested.

Not really a fix but the best I could find for now. I dislike this feature immensely.

Force touch the contact you want to no longer appear in sharing, select “suggest less”

The thing is, it's not "most people."

Certainly the tech press loves the feature, as do I and most people I've talked to.

However if you don't, provide feedback to Apple and if enough people complain, they may modify it.

Feedback - iPhone - Apple

As far as posts being removed, that happens not for disagreements but for violation of the Apple Support Communities Terms of Use.

Read them and comply and your post will not be deleted.

However note that these are not standard Internet discussion forums - they are for people to post a specific question as to how to do something and for fellow Apple users to answer them (so to use this thread as an example, to ask how to disable contacts in the Share Sheet and for users to reply with the answer - "you can't.")

Someone else posted a screenshot of a convo with Apple, this is a new iOS 13 feature that cannot be turned off. I hope Apple engineers understand how annoying this feature is and either take it out or make it editable so we can get rid of the contacts we don’t want there. Meaning... most of the ones that end up showing.

i didn't call you names, i merely questioned your sanity and your motivations ...

where are the mods to just lock this thread and stop wasting everyone's time ?

you can't turn off suggested message contacts in the share menu ... that's it .... but the thread goes on like rasputin because you guys just don't give up

it's both funny and profoundly weird at the same time

Not going to read through all the replies the fix for me was removing text messages from the favorites tab.

safari web page - share button- more-edit-under favorites- swipe left- remove messages

turned off phone. When share tab is available on safari, contacts will still be there but when you tap on them nothing happens. Nothing is sent/accidentally sent. Worked for me!!!

If you delete the entire message thread of a contact it then deletes them from suggested.

Not really a fix but the best I could find for now.

KrazyCat wrote:

or just a freaking switch to turn it on or off

Submit your feedback to Apple. No one here can give you what you want.